Tension Creates Accuracy!?

[Ruro]

People say don't tense because it will "bust you up", fine, I accept that, infact I already suffered from it once. But it becomes Ironic when using tense Fingers... I can play the scales PERFECTLY in Arabesque. I'm not sure if this applies to Innocence... which I started last night, because that has longer scales (and isn't even C Major).

It may just be I have the keys for Arabesque ingrained in me, so it works better? Fact is, relaxing as much as possible to refrain from injury (as you do) causes me to make sloppy scales that aren't even in synch with the chords - synchronization seems a problem for me :/ Although tensing practicly solves everything... any ideas why?

A bad thing presumably to start using to get the piece right! I guess if you have the time, tips for arm and wrist movements to get them perfect would be nice as well >_< Apart from making you look fancy, I can imagine bringing the wrist up when hitting 1/2/3/4/5, or slight wrist rotations would help? Guess work this is :/ But I don't wanna work on a method that doesn't aid me, hence no guess work will be put to practise without confirmation.

Thankyou for your time as always people! ^_^

[Bob]

I remember going through something like this once.

"Relax as much as possible.  That's the way. "

True in a sense.  But you do need some tension too and it is ok to tense up in certain ways.

I work toward building things up to be in good shape and have good form (good form to the movement of the body I mean).  Some muscles should be working and they might need to be pushed  in order to grow.  Pushing needs to be careful an the body has to heal up.  Some boney place, like the hands, have to be approached cautiously since they take awhile to heal up.

Once things have been pushed, you can also "ease" things by relaxing.  That's another way to slowly shape your body into a better form.

[Ruro]

Once things have been pushed, you can also "ease" things by relaxing

I see... like defusing the bomb in TWINE for the N64, if you do too much... then you die :/ But if you use the defuser kit for a moment, your fine and you are closer to defusing Tension is a reserve of special skill that must be used in bursts? This keeps getting more interesting!

Anyhow, tension builds strength and form.... I suppose form means posture and stuff? Very useful... I have a good habit of sitting upright and stuff now, I don't seem to encounter problems that involve me changing my stance to fix it

So i'm now gathering, you need to tense once in a while, to raise your "relaxing" skills, it's sounds like both Tension Meter and Relaxation Meter will rise, and in the end being COMPLETELY tensed with no skills is the equivalent of being relaxed with skills, WHILST being able to play fast runs and stuff Atleast that's my interpretation of your words, and maybe a little overboard.

Thanks alot for the information! ^_^

**Although theres a problem with my theory, if I need to tense most the time in Arabesque, then I have poor relaxation skills? If it's even called a skill ¬_¬ I'll go back now and try again!

[Daevren]

Too much tension means tensing a muscle not needed in the finger movement required for playing. Or even working against the movement. Obviously this is not good. This means the muscles doing the motion required need to create an even larger force to overcome the force created by the other muscles.

You only want to use the muscles needed. People with great technique are very good at this. Untrained people do not have this dexterity. If they try to move their hands their brains will activate all kinds of muscles. A trained people will be able to activate a very minimal number of muscles. This is why piano playing is largely mental.

Of course there are other factors invlovled in this.

As for your contradictory experience. Maybe your brain is used to tension in your hand muscles and takes into account these factors.

Maybe a experienced piano teacher can confirm you have to 'relearn', or adjust,  to play with relaxed hands.

I don't think muscles need to be pushed to grow. But playing fast is different from playing slow. Your brain needs to practice both to learn both. If you play piano often your muscles will adjust without the need for them to be pushed and damaged.

All this doesn't mean you shouldn't tense your muscles. Obviously the muscles needed for a movement need to tense in order to move. And they need to tense fast and hard to move fast and/or hard. But you don't want unneeded muscles to tense. Their 'force vectors' block or disrupt the movement wanted.